Of kittens and teacups and love
by renrenren3
Summary: Modern AU in which Charles and Erik are flatmates. Charles studies psychology and likes tea and chess and keeps bringing home stray kittens, and Erik lets him because he's maybe perhaps a little bit sort of in love with him.
1. Of Kittens and Teacups and Love

Charles and Erik are best friends. They've been since freshman year, when Erik had just moved to the US from Europe and didn't know anyone at Harvard, but hated them anyway because at the time Erik hated everyone.

To be fair he still hates most people, but he always find it difficult to hate Charles, even when he's stressed about finals and wakes up Erik at three in the morning to recite him the names and key traits of personality disorders until Erik is convinced that he has at least a dozen of those. Not even when Charles drags him to the bookstore for the third time in the same week and buys enough books to fill a small library and Erik is the one who has to actually carry them home. Not even when they order pizza and Charles spends thirty minutes choosing what to have and then orders something off the menu and then decides that Erik's plain mushroom pizza looks much better. And Erik ends up caving under the puppy eyes and splits his pizza with Charles and ends up with half a plate of something that is less pizza and more pineapple and bacon and eggs and eggplant and meatballs and zebra.

Charles is very good at the puppy eyes thing. He'll point those ridiculously blue eyes on Erik and stare and _pout_, because God help him, Charles is the kind of person who pouts. And Erik just won't be able to stay mad at him. Like the first time they met, when Erik was so furious and angry with everyone and everything that he felt ready to go back to Poland, swimming across the Atlantic if he needed to, and he didn't feel particularly well-disposed towards posh psychology students who _just happened to have overheard his screaming match with the Dean and apologized for being too forward but could maybe offer a solution to Erik's housing problem_. To this day, Erik still doesn't know why he accepted Charles's offer to move in with him. He's often had the chance to regret his decision (usually at three in the morning under finals) and at the same time he doesn't know how he could have survived the past few years without Charles.

Sweet, reliable, old Charles. Erik had tried to warn him. He wasn't the best roommate, he was moody, not very talkative, Charles had just met him... All of Erik's protests had been for nothing. Charles had practically bullied Erik into moving in with him, by being stubborn and polite and helpful and infuriatingly calm. Erik had felt like screaming that he had issues, damn it, he wasn't a good person, he'd done some really fucked up shit. Charles was a good person and didn't deserve to have someone like Erik in his life. And Charles had just stared at him as if he could read his mind and he'd said that he'd never met anyone quite like Erik and he thought they could be great friends.

So that's how Erik and his two suitcases had ended up in the spare room of Charles's flat. Which really wasn't a flat but some kind of miniature mansion, because which kind of student lives in a place with three bedrooms, a study, a dining room, a living room and two bathrooms? The kitchen alone was larger than some of the places where Erik had lived. Charles had looked at Erik's suitcases and asked when he was going to get the rest of his stuff, and Erik had said that was it, and remembered that at the time it had seemed like a lot of things to take along and maybe he could have just brought the larger suitcase and left the second one behind. And most of all Erik worried that Charles was treating him like his pet charity case, like a stray kitten that he'd brought home because it looked pitiful and defenseless.

Except now Erik knows that Charles feels that way towards everyone. He's like some kind of masked hero, out to save the world, except instead of tacky spandex suits he wears crisp shirts and cardigans and half gloves. And at some point during their first year together he did bring home a stray kitten. It was a dark ball of fur, not bigger than Erik's fist, and Charles was holding it reverently in his arms and cooing over it as if he was the single most beautiful thing in all of existence.

He'd immediately asked, pleaded even, if they could keep it. And Erik had been so torn because he didn't like animals, not even ones as sickeningly cute as this kitten, they were just a nuisance and they got in the way. But it's not like he could have told Charles what to do in his own home, even though Charles was asking for his permission, and Erik doesn't even know why Charles was asking since he was just a freeloader. Whenever he tried to tell Charles that he would be happy to pay half of the rent, Charles changed the subject, and Erik had later learned that his family owned the whole apartment building. Which was infuriating since Erik was sure he couldn't have afforded to stay in a place half as nice as this, and Charles didn't even let him pay the electricity bills. Erik had retaliated by getting Charles a first edition of Christopher Isherwood that he'd found on eBay for Christmas, and Charles had been so happy about it that he'd quite literally started jumping around the room and had almost stepped on Moira's tail.

Because they'd kept the kitten, obviously. Erik hadn't been able to say anything in the face of Charles's obvious enthusiasm, and then Raven had come home and saw the kitten and started fawning over it. Then Erik had been faced with two pairs of puppy eyes, plus a pair of kitten eyes, and he'd just sighed and said _yeah sure let's keep it _and had gone googling what to feed kittens and how you find out if it's a boy kitten or a girl kitten. It turned out that _she_ was a girl kitten and they'd named her Moira. Naming the kitten had been one of the single most difficult decisions they had to take. Raven wanted to name her Nightprowler, which sounded ridiculous, but Charles wanted to name her after some famous dead scientist, which sounded even more ridiculous.

The two siblings had argued for almost one hour while Erik sprawled on the sofa with his laptop and let the kitten play with a loose thread on his sleeve and went slightly insane as he read blogs about cats written by crazy cat ladies. And then Charles had turned towards Erik and had asked _how would you name her, my friend?_ and Raven had glared at him and Erik had felt cornered like never in his life. He couldn't side with either Charles or Raven without forever alienating the other one, because apparently kitten names were serious business. He was supposed to side with Charles because Charles was his best friend, but at the same time Erik felt that it was probably customary to let bratty younger sisters pick the pet names. Erik didn't have any particular attachment to Raven, she was just Charles's little stepsister who liked Taylor Swift and wore so much make up that sometimes her face looked blue and drove Charles mad because he was completely incapable of keeping her in check.

Erik was so not taking sides in the argument about kitten names, so he'd just blurted out the first name that had come into his mind. _Moira_, he'd said, and so he'd turned the standstill into a three-way standstill. But then Charles had thought about it and decided it was posh enough for his standards and he liked it and he would be the better man and give up his claims on kitten naming. So Raven, being in the minority, had caved in and allowed them to call the kitten Moira, though Erik is sure than when they're not around she calls her Moira Nightprowler. And then they'd all gone out to the pet shop to buy special kitten milk or whatever it is that kittens needed, and of course they'd gone back full of cat food and cat toys and cat beds and enough to raise their own cat army.

Which is fortunate because in the next months Charles had apparently embarked on a mission to adopt all of Massachussets's strays. After Moira had come Emma, who was white as snow and always gave Erik the impression that she was looking down on him, which was quite a feat for something that didn't even reach up to his calf. Then came Azazel and Riptide, who couldn't be saved from Raven's unfortunate naming skills. Riptide is grey and nondescript and quiet, while Azazel is huge and ginger and likes to sleep on Erik's legs so he'll wake up with no circulation in his feet. And then there's Shaw. Erik is sure that Shaw is the spawn of a demon, sent over from Hell itself to wreck havoc in the world. Shaw is out to kill Erik, that much has been clear ever since the first time Erik stared into his yellow, evil eyes.

He had tried to explain that to Charles, but Charles had just laughed at him and petted the evil black monster and told Erik not to be silly. Which was infuriating because nobody had a right to told Erik that he was silly, especially not grown men who adopted kittens and thought it acceptable to say _my friend_ every two sentences, as casual as you please, without any regard for the fact that Erik's stomach did a little twist every time. So Erik had just glared at Shaw, who had glared back, and he'd said, _okay, the hellspawn can stay_. As a thank you, Shaw had sunk his claws into Erik's arms and attempted to maul him.

Charles had been very apologetic about it, glaring at Shaw and saying _bad kitty_ over and over while Erik clenched his wounded arm to try and stop the bleeding, and also tried to stop himself from killing the damn cat because it was still Charles's cat and Charles would probably be sad. Then Charles had seen the blood on Erik's arm and had gone pale and it took Erik a lot of effort to persuade him not to call 911. Instead, Raven had been dispatched to the nearest pharmacy and she had clearly taken after Charles's shopping habits since she had come back laden with bandages and disinfectant. Erik tried to tell Charles that he'd had much worse, but Charles wouldn't be placated until he had wrapped Erik's arm from wrist to elbow in bandages. And then he let Erik order dinner from his favorite takeaway place.

So Erik is by now resigned to the fact that their home has been turned into some kind of shelter for orphaned kittens. It's Charles's home, to be honest, but by now it's a technicality. Erik is quite sure that Charles would pout him to death if he ever tried moving out. Not that Erik would want to move out, he likes living with Charles, murderous cats notwithstanding. Charles is quiet, never listens to loud music, or actually any music composed in the past hundred years. He's neat, bordering on neat freak, but Erik is the same so he has no complaints about that. He even cooks, a little, just enough to ensure that they're not just living out of takeaway boxes.

One night Erik mentions that he misses his mother's chłopski posiłek and the next day Charles returns from his daily trip to the bookstore with a book of Polish recipes. Apparently the concepts of searching things on the internet instead of buying even more stuff isn't very clear to him. Then they have to go grocery shopping, because their fridge is mostly empty save for a couple of bottled of beer and a large tub of Raven's favorite cookie dough ice cream. Erik takes control of the shopping cart while Charles runs around like an overexcited kid and pretends that he can tell which leeks look good and which ones don't. Erik bags their groceries in their socially conscious reusable shopping bag while Charles flirts with the pretty cashier and completely fails to get her number, for which Erik teases him to no end while they walk home.

They chop the vegetables side by side while Raven perches on the kitchen table and munches on pieces of bacon, and Charles is torn between telling her off for ruining her appetite and trying some himself. Erik has no such compunctions and steals the rest of the bacon, so they end up having to replace it with ham. Then they have an argument over cooking times because they can't agree on what _until it turns brown_ means, Erik argues that there's different shades of brown and anyway it is such an unscientific time, couldn't they just print how many minutes you should cook the damn sausage.

They end up with something that might not be authentic chłopski posiłek, but at least it's edible and they didn't destroy the kitchen in the process, though the mess they made doesn't seem proportioned to the four servings. Because, obviously, neither of them read the line of text at the bottom saying four servings until the very end. So they end up inviting Hank, who lives next door and has a crush on Raven, which Erik finds hilarious. The cats feast on the leftovers and Azazel gets, if possible, fatter overnight.

The next morning Erik complains about it to Charles. It doesn't seem fair that Azazel keeps using _him_ as a pillow when he's got a perfectly comfortable cat bed in a corner of the living room. Azazel never bothers Raven or Charles either, which Erik finds unfair. "You're probably very comfortable to sleep on, my friend," Charles mumbles, and it's early in the morning and he hasn't had any tea yet and his eyes are a little unfocused, so Erik doesn't argue and gives him a mug of Earl Grey. The mugs have got a cat pattern too, Raven made them in her art class. Her mug has a blue cat, Erik's mug has a yellow cat and Charles's mugs have red cats. He's got two mugs because he's drinking tea all the time and doesn't want to bother with washing up when he's caught up in something.

Charles is very passionate about his major, which is psychology. He's got this uncanny ability for reading people and telling you what you're thinking, sometimes even when you weren't aware that you were thinking it. Erik is used to keeping his emotions all bottled up inside, but it's hard when Charles can take a glance at him and guess whether Erik is happy or angry or tired like it's some kind of magic trick. Then, if Erik is in a good mood and willing to listen, Charles will ramble on about a particularly interesting lecture or about the last book he read. And if Erik had a bad day and doesn't feel like listening they'll just get the chessboard and play in silence until the quiet clicks of the chess pieces has washed away everything else from Erik's mind.

Erik is studying engineering. He's not too enthusiastic about it, not on Charles's levels, but most of the courses are interesting and his professors are good. His initial choice of major had been physics but he'd ended up choosing something more practical and less theoretic. Charles doesn't really understand that, he's a firm believer in studying whatever you love the most. Then again Charles never had to worry about future job prospects, what with the whole rich family background. Erik doesn't begrudge him that because, if there's a person who deserves to live a spoiled and pampered life, that's Charles, who spends most of his money on books and tea and cat food.

Besides, it's not like Charles's family ever gave him much apart from the money. Charles doesn't like to talk about it and Erik doesn't like to ask, but he's heard enough over the years to learn that Charles and Raven didn't come from a happy home. Their father was always working, their mother was too busy with her life to have time for two kids who had been left to themselves and to an endless string of nannies and teachers. This explains why Charles doesn't want to visit his family during winter break or spring break, and when he has to go home in the summer he becomes miserable and asks Erik to go with him and Raven.

Erik accepts in a heartbeat, because it's not as if he's got anyone waiting for him at home in Poland. He's not even sure if he can call Poland his home any more, it feels like it's just this place where he used to live after Germany and before Harvard. It never felt _home_, not like the flat he shares with Charles and Raven does. So he stays with them for the summer and finally finds out why Charles always thought their place was small. His family manor his huge. Erik would probably get lost on his way to the bathroom if his room didn't have its own private bathroom. But the place feels cold and Charles's father isn't there and Charles's mother is so painfully not interested in her son. It makes Erik want to scream _don't you see how brilliant he is, can't you at least pretend to care_. The worst part is that Charles and Raven expected nothing different and are just staring dully at the dinner plates.

That night Erik tosses over in the huge four-poster bed for almost one hour before giving up and knocking on Charles's door. Charles wasn't sleeping either, he opens the door wearing a ridiculous dressing gown, which makes Erik crack up with laughter. Charles drags Erik into his room before he can wake everyone in the house and argues that sleeping gowns are very comfortable and perfectly fashionable, to which Erik replies that maybe Charles is a time traveler from another age, which would explain a lot. Charles pouts and worries about their kittens and worries whether Hank will treat them well. Erik thinks they should call them cats now, since nothing that large could be termed kitten any more, and is more worried that Shaw won't maul Hank during their absence.

They end up watching a James Bond movie with the audio off and Erik ad-libs most of the dialogue, which makes the movie infinitely funnier. Especially when Charles joins in during the sex scene, showing an hitherto unsuspected skill with innuendos, and they exchange lines that get more and more outrageous until Erik makes kissy kissy noises and Charles cracks up, burying his face into the pillow to muffle his laughter. The next morning at the breakfast table Erik asks Charles to pass him the marmalade in his best Sean Connery voice and they both start laughing, and everyone stares at them like they're mental. After that, staying at the manor for the next month doesn't seem that hard any more.

All the same, Erik is glad when they go back to Harvard in September. Not because he misses the cats, of course, that's just Charles, who had been getting more and more mental with all his messages to Hank and the phone calls and _tell them that me and Erik say hi, we're coming home soon and we miss them_. Erik most definitely didn't say _hi_ to the cats. But he did miss the quiet of their flat, and not having two flight of stairs between the bedroom and the dining room, and cooking breakfast while Charles makes tea and tries not to yawn and pretends he didn't work on a paper all night instead of sleeping. Erik knows Charles didn't sleep because he could hear the rattling of the keyboard in the next room, the walls are that thin, but he pretends not to know and stops Charles when he attempts to put the milk in the cupboard and the sugar in the fridge.

Most of all, Erik missed the pub on the corner, which is where they spend almost all their Friday nights. They're there so often that Angel the bartender knows their names and she's already drawing two pints of beer and greeting them with _hi Charles and Erik_ as soon as they step through the door. Erik leans back in his chair and watches with a small smile as Charles tries to hit on some pretty girl with the same hackneyed lines about psychology that Erik knows by heart by now. Then Charles gives up and joins Erik at the table and they order a second round from Angel. She's all right, Angel, though Erik thinks that her eyes are shifty. Charles insists that Erik doesn't like her because at first she'd assumed that the two of them were a couple. It had been quite embarrassing and she'd got very flustered when they'd explained that they were just friends, stammering apologies and _you're always in here on your own and you live together and you talk about your cats and I'm sorry I assumed_, while Charles's face went red and Erik thought, of course it's the cats' fault.

Just because he's gay and Charles flirts with anything that moves, that doesn't mean that they are a couple. Or that they should be a couple. Or that they ever considered being a couple. Not even when they have a family of adopted cats and go shopping for new cat toys and have a row in the middle of the aisle because Erik doesn't want Charles to spoil the cats any more than he already has and Charles holds out something fluffy and squeaky and says _but Erik this is blue and they'll love it and just this one_. Not even when they both know each other's order everywhere, even Charles's insane pizza order, and they always steal bits of each other's food and fight for the last dumpling whenever they order Chinese food. Not even when Charles gets home exhausted on Tuesdays because he's had eight hours of lessons with almost no breaks and he shoves his feet in Erik's lap and Erik gives him a foot rub and Charles sighs and professes undying love for him.

Okay, so maybe. Maybe Erik has thought about it, once or twice, very quietly because Charles and his uncanny mind-reading skills are not to be underestimated. He's thought about telling Charles that he's maybe perhaps a little bit sort of in love with him but he's never actually done anything because it seems like an epically bad idea. Charles is the best thing that's ever happened to him, despite the cats and the bad tea addiction and the fact that he drags Erik to watch bad movies just so they can fling pop corns at the screen together. Erik doesn't want to risk all of that by making things between them awkward with some ill-timed confession. And, even if Charles went all teary-eyed and said _I've loved you since I laid eyes on you, my friend, let's get married and live in my ridiculously big family mansion and run a kitten orphanage_, then what?

They're already a couple by most people's standards. They go on plenty of dates, so to speak. Erik brought Charles to the zoo once for his birthday because, if it wasn't already clear from the horde of cats, Charles loves animals. Charles had compared Erik to one of the sharks at the aquarium and Erik had no idea why but he thought sharks were magnificent creatures, and then Erik hadn't been able to tell which animal he thought Charles was most like, so he'd stammered something about _small and furry and big eyed and cuddly_ and then he'd felt horribly embarrassed and gone to buy them ice creams to avoid Charles's snicker. Charles always sits on Erik's right at the movies, so he can steal Erik's pop corns when he's finished his own, and Erik pretends not to notice.

They live together, do laundry together because otherwise Charles would to separate his whites from the coloreds, they walk together to classes, study together in the library, have lunch together even when it's impractical because they're on opposite parts of the campus. They sleep separately but that's a mere technicality because they're always in and out of each other's rooms. At first Erik was bothered by the fact that Charles hardly ever knocked before walking in, but it's not as if there's ever a time when Erik wants Charles to stay out. Sometimes they cram together for finals, sprawled on the same bed and surrounded by piles of textbooks, until they both fall asleep and wake up the next morning complaining that Erik snores and Charles kicks him in his sleep.

The only difference that there would be in this hypothetical scenario in which Charles is madly in love with Erik is that they'd have sex too. Not that Erik hasn't thought about it. Once or twice, very, very quietly, feeling the tips of his ears go red, because he's seen Charles almost naked on several occasions, wearing nothing but socks and boxers after a very bad night of drinking, or wrapped in a towel and dripping everywhere and complaining about cold water and a broken heater, or in his swimming trunks at the pool when he'd dragged Erik along and then asked him to help him put sunscreen on because Charles has ridiculously fair skin. This is usually the point where Erik stops thinking about almost-naked Charles, because that way lies only madness and an epic case of the blue balls.

So they carry on pretending that they're not acting like an old married couple all the time and they do everything together and they are always each other's plus one to everything, to the point that when Charles gets invites they don't say _bring your plus one_ they say _bring Erik_ and vice versa. Because it's not like they don't have friends apart from each other. Erik has got a few people from classes that he gets along with, and a couple of other friends he met at the gym, but then he started dragging Charles along to the gym and it just made sense that Charles should hang out with Erik and his friends whenever Erik and his friends decided to hang out. And Charles has got tons of friends, he knows everyone on campus and remembers everyone's name and birthday and favorite color, which baffles Erik because this is the same Charles that sometimes forgets to eat when he's too absorbed in a book. But Charles knows everyone and likes to hang out with everyone and he always brings Erik along, even that time when everyone in his modern philosophy class decides to have karaoke night and Charles doesn't know any of the songs and ends up singing a duet with Erik and makes up half of the words.

And one night they're on the couch watching a marathon of Doctor Who and maybe Erik has been drinking more than usual because Raven is sleeping over at a friend and they don't have to act like good role models for anyone but the cats, and the cats are already spoiled rotten anyway. So Erik refills Charles's glass and points his finger around the room going all _exterminate, exterminate_ and Shaw glares at him while Charles giggles. And maybe it's the alcohol, or because Doomsday is such a depressing episode, or because Erik would be hard pressed to find a term that describes the way their arms and legs are entangled aside from cuddling, or because of the way Charles's lips curve in the soft light coming from the tv screen. Maybe later he'll plead temporary insanity.

The thing is, Erik leans forward and says _I'm maybe perhaps a little bit sort of in love with you_, and then has a full three seconds to freak out about it before Charles leans forward too and replies _I've loved you since I laid eyes on you, my friend_. And there's no talk of marriage or kitten orphanages, but there's a lot of making out on the couch under the cats' unimpressed stare until they fall off and decide to move to Charles's bedroom, and also close the door to get some privacy from the cats, whom Erik thinks should mind their own business. And then Erik finds out just what he's been missing out in all those years of not having sex with Charles.

They wake up tangled together at six in the morning because Charles forgot to pull down the blinds last night and he's also stolen the blanket overnight, but Erik doesn't mind. Then, several hours later, when they finally get out of bed, Erik cooks breakfast while Charles makes tea and says that they're almost out of sugar and they should put it on the shopping list, and Erik says they just bought sugar and Charles should stop putting so much sugar in his tea, and they argue about it until Raven gets home.

And the best part is that it isn't awkward at all to be in a relationship with your best friend, or maybe it's because they're best friends, though Raven insists it's because really they've been dating all of this time and it just took them a long, long time to figure it out. She's probably right.


	2. ABC Drabbles

_Notes: I wasn't planning on writing more in this 'verse, but I got so many positive comments and requests for a sequel and I'm easily swayed. Seriously, I never got half as many comments on a story, I couldn't stop smiling whenever I got an email notification. This isn't quite a sequel, it's for an activity at maridichallenge (write 26 drabbles for prompts starting with each letter of the alphabet). Some drabbles are linked, like the story of Charles and Erik's trip to Europe, and some aren't. Either way, MORE KITTENS!_

* * *

><p><strong>Antefact<strong>

Charles and Erik are best friends. They're students at Harvard and they live in Charles's huge flat along with Charles's sister and a ridiculous number of cats. Charles is to blame for the cats. He keeps bringing home stray kittens because they're cute and cuddly and Charles likes things that are cute and cuddly. It's a mystery why he also likes Erik, who's the opposite of cute and cuddly, but Erik isn't going to complain. Lately, finally, Charles and Erik got together. When they told people they only got confused looks because everyone thought they'd been dating since freshman year.

**Brother**

One day at dinner Raven announces that she's going out with Hank. Charles immediately goes into overprotective big brother mode and argues that Raven is too young and there's too big an age difference and this is so sudden and have they really thought this through. Raven rolls her eyes and points out that, unlike _some people_, she doesn't need years before realizing that she likes someone. Also she doesn't need any safe sex talk, the walls of the flat are thin and she heard more than enough last night. Erik laughs into his napkin. Raven keeps dating Hank.

**Coffee**

Erik likes coffee better than tea, which is a problem because somehow around Charles everything turns into tea. Erik looks for coffee in the morning and ends up finding three different kinds of tea, assorted teabags and even a vile instant tea that nobody likes very much, but no coffee. If Erik didn't know any better, he'd say it's all a ploy for Charles to convert him to his evil tea-drinking ways. But it's early and he's sleepy, so he gives up and lets Charles pour him a cup of Earl Grey. Later he finds the coffee in another cupboard.

**Decisions**

Charles decides that he wants to go away somewhere for spring break. He's already started planning their itinerary before he tells Erik about his plans. Erik hates it when Charles takes this kind of decisions without telling him, because a week abroad is one of those things he'd never be able to afford if it wasn't for Charles. But when Erik says so Charles's face falls and he says _I'm sorry_ and _if you don't want to go we can just stay home and watch tv with the cats_. And Erik knows that he'll go wherever Charles decides to go.

**Europe**

They end up picking Europe as their destination: France, Belgium and Germany, because Charles wants to see everything. Erik is still feeling bad about Charles paying for his plane ticket, so Charles says that his German is rusty and Erik can make himself useful by helping him practice. Erik thinks this is stupid because he's seen Charles reading Kant's _Kritik der reinen Vernunft_ and his German is flawless already. But it's a good thing that they're practicing because the first time Erik hears Charles speaking German he can't stop himself from pushing him on the couch and kissing him silly.

**Flight**

There's some turbulence on the flight to Paris. The lights overhead keep signaling that they should keep their seatbelts on, and there's the occasional passenger being sick or breaking into hysterics because they watched too many disaster movies. Charles keeps sneaking glances at Erik. Erik asks him if he's afraid of flying and Charles says he's not. Erik isn't afraid of flying either, which is a shame since it would have been the perfect excuse to hold Charles's hand. But Charles has been thinking along the same lines, because he gives Erik a sheepish smile and twines their fingers together.

**Guidebook**

Charles has a pocket guide to Europe that he carries everywhere. Its pages are full of notes written in Charles's small, tidy hand, and there is a veritable rainbow of post-its sticking out to mark all the places that Charles wants to see. The post-its are color-coded too: green for castles, blue for churches and so on. Erik thinks that to see everything they would need superpowers or a time machine or both, but he doesn't say anything and lets Charles read him paragraph after paragraph describing the history of Notre Dame from the twelfth century to the present day.

**Heat**

It's so damn hot today, Erik isn't sure how he managed to follow Charles around all morning without collapsing. Even Charles is somewhat less perky than usual, wiping the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand and ineffectively trying to fan himself with his guidebook. Erik cuts short their tour of Munich's inner city and drags Charles to the nearest ice cream parlor. They sit outside, at a table that's thankfully shielded from the unseasonably warm sun, and Erik does his best not to get distracted by the way Charles licks his pistachio and hazelnut ice cream.

**Intentions**

The first time Charles and Erik go back to the manor after getting together, Mrs Xavier asks Erik what his intentions are. She uses that word, _intentions_, as if they're in a period drama and Charles is a naive youth and Erik has a crazy wife hidden in the attic. Erik can't say his intentions are strictly honorable, that wouldn't be truthful, not when he's already despoiled Charles, but he recalls some despoiling on Charles's part too. That's not the kind of thing that you tell your boyfriend's mother, though, so he just tells Mrs Xavier that he loves Charles.

**Jealousy**

Charles doesn't even realize how much of a flirt he is. It just happens. He walks into a coffee shop with Erik and leans across the counter as he's placing his order, batting his eyelids and smiling at the pretty barista and commenting on her red hair. Erik tries not to be jealous, he knows that's just how Charles acts, but sometimes the barista flirts back and then Erik isn't able to hold back. He steps into Charles's personal space and wraps one arm possessively around him and snarls at the barista until she hurries away to get their coffees.

**Kittens**

There have been several blissful months without any additions to their growing cat army, possibly due to the fact that Charles still feels guilty for Shaw almost clawing off Erik's arm, but Erik never thought Charles would stop at five cats. It's only a matter of time before Charles brings home even more. This time it's two kittens at the same time, both deceptively small and soft and cuddly. Havok is set on destroying the furniture with his tiny claws, while Banshee is set on destroying their eardrums and their sleep by meowing at all times of day and night.

**Like**

Erik doesn't know why people would think he likes the cats. Erik barely tolerates the cats. Erik doesn't want any more cats, thank you very much. Erik secretly sneaks them food, and when the cats try to get Erik's attention in front of Charles he acts all annoyed but inside he's all I_'m sorry Moira I'll make it up to you when my boyfriend isn't around and I can play with you without damaging my reputation as a badass that isn't swayed by a cute kitten, not even one as cute as you_. Obviously this doesn't fool Charles at all.

**Mastermind**

Shaw is the exception. Erik tries to warm up to Shaw, but Shaw tries to claw Erik's face whenever Erik gets close to him, so it's not really working. Charles insists that Shaw is a big softie _just like Erik really_, and Erik doesn't know what he did that was so terrible that his boyfriend feels the need to compare him to a monster cat. He's sure that Shaw is only acting nice around Charles to hide his criminal mastermind plans. He keeps an eye on Shaw to make sure he's not being a bad influence to Havok and Banshee.

**Nature**

Charles is very passionate about protecting the nature. They have reusable shopping bags for their groceries and they recycle paper, plastic, glass and aluminum. PETA should give them a badge for their efforts at adopting every cat in continental America. Charles also buys organic stuff and tells Raven off for using hair spray. Erik doesn't really care that much about nature: he's in the habit of buying whatever's cheapest and tells Raven that she looks better without any make up but she's free to go out looking however she likes. Charles frowns but he's given up trying to convert him.

**Ownership**

It's somewhat of a mystery but, when people are talking about the cats, they refer to them as Charles and Erik's cats. Not Charles's cats. Not even Charles and Erik and Raven's cats, even though Raven lives with them and named most of the cats and takes dozens of cat pictures and posts them on Twitter. Eventually, Erik has to cave in and accept half-ownership of the cat army. Charles insists it's a cat family, not army, but Erik says that they should use cats to take over the world and turn it into a benevolent dictatorship under Charles's rule.

**Photo**

Raven likes taking photos. She takes photos of everything. Moira, her room, her shoes, Azazel and Emma, a muffin, the rain outside her window, the sky outside her window after the rain, Riptide, herself and lately, alarmingly, Erik. It's not normal photos either, where she'd ask him to smile and Erik would flip her off and walk away. Raven sneaks on everyone like a ninja and takes snapshots of Erik folding his laundry or reading a book or watching tv with Charles. And then she prints the photos and pins them to the fridge or the walls of the apartment.

**Quest**

One afternoon, Shaw runs away. Charles is worried sick and embarks in an epic cat-finding quest. He roams the streets armed with milk and Shaw's favorite toy mouse (which is the blue squeaky one) trying to lure him out. Then it gets dark and it starts raining and Charles panics because _what is poor little helpless Shaw going to do he's going to be all cold and alone_. And Erik is holding an umbrella over him and tries to comfort him and he'd like Shaw to die in a ditch somewhere but then Charles would never stop crying.

**Return**

The tip of Charles's nose is going red from the cold and that's not good. Erik finally convinces Charles that they need to go home and resume their search tomorrow, and when they get home they find Shaw sitting on the doorstep with a dead mouse, looking smug. Charles is all happy and praises him while Erik plots murder. Then Erik wraps Charles in a blanket because he's looking a bit pale and maybe he's got the beginnings of a cold, and they snuggle on the couch eating leftover pizza and the cats get all the anchovies on Charles's slice.

**Studying**

Finals are always a stressful time. Erik is studying day and night because he needs to pass all his exams with insanely high marks to keep his scholarship, and Charles is studying day and night because he's Charles and he's a perfectionist and he doesn't want to slack off when Erik can't. So they're both slightly neurotic and sleep deprived during the few days before the last exam. But sometimes while they're studying they raise their head from the textbooks at the same time and smile for a moment before turning the page, and it makes things a little better.

**Television**

Erik never cared for tv before coming to live with Charles, but Charles loves watching movies and tv series. Charles likes _Doctor Who_ and every other British series, which coupled with his posh upbringing and his tea obsession confirms Erik's theory that Charles is actually a spy on Her Majesty's secret service. Charles likes to watch _House_ while Raven covers her eyes and refuses to watch when there's blood on the screen. Charles even likes to watch Disney movies and sometimes he'll hum along to the songs, and Erik is torn between teasing him to no end and joining in.

**Unity**

They're organized like this. Charles cooks, with some help from Erik, and he's in charge of ordering take away when there's no time to cook and he washes the dishes. Erik goes grocery shopping, usually with Charles tagging along, stops Charles from buying too much useless stuff and fixes the odd thing that breaks down and dries the dishes. Raven cleans the house and vacuums on Saturdays. The three of them all unite their strength to catch the cats and get them into their cat carriers whenever they need to go see the vet. They make a pretty good team.

**Veterinary**

The one thing that Erik hates the most about cats, excluding all the times when Shaw tried to ambush and kill him, it's having to bring the cats to the vet. It's torture for both the cats and for Erik. Charles doesn't mind, he's all full of positive stuff and cheerfulness and _it helps them stay healthy so it's a good thing_. He doesn't seem to mind the fact that a cat that has been cooped up in a cat carrier and brought to see the vet and back is a cat that will act crazy for the next day.

**Whisper**

Erik has some very bad memories. He hasn't told Charles much about his first eighteen years and thankfully Charles never asked. Erik tries not to think about his past, and most of the times he manages not to remember, but he can't stop the nightmares. He doesn't know if Charles knew about those already, but he can't stop him from noticing when they're sleeping together and Erik wakes up in the middle of the night shaking and drenched in cold sweat. And Charles is holding him tight and whispering that it's okay, he's okay now, until Erik falls asleep again.

**Xavier**

It's a strange name, Xavier. Erik would have associated it more easily with someone of Spanish or Brazilian descent, not with Charles, whose family has lived in their huge mansion in Westchester County for ten generations. Then again Charles is a riddle. He looks like he ought to be British rather than American. One day, Erik and Charles and Raven get into a discussion about surnames. Raven smirks and asks Charles if he's planning to take Erik's surname after their wedding. Charles goes red and stammers something incoherent while Erik fights a sudden urge to try and sign Erik Xavier.

**Yellow**

Charles is always complaining that Erik's wardrobe is boring and that Erik wears nothing but turtlenecks in various shades of black, dark gray and dark blue. Erik doesn't pay much heed to that, because Charles also occasionally lets it slip that Erik's ass looks great in his dark jeans. Then, for Erik's birthday, Raven gets him a yellow hoodie. Erik is sure that Charles had a hand in this, because his face when Erik unwraps the gift is far too gleeful. Much to his chagrin, Erik is forced to wear it and walk around in a _yellow and black hoodie_.

**Zombie**

It's almost midnight, it's been a long day and they're watching a zombie movie. About halfway through, Raven stops trying to hide her yawns and goes to bed. Charles stubbornly refuses to follow her example because he hates leaving anything unfinished, even when it's a tacky B-movie where the blood is obviously ketchup and the zombies look more fake than Halloween costumes. Erik has no such compunctions, so he puts his head on Charles's shoulder and dozes off. He dreams that there's a zombie apocalypse, but it's okay because Charles has got his back and together they'll save the cats.


	3. Thursday Night

_Note: Apparently, whenever I need to write something in a pinch I'll go back to the kittens. This one's for Peyton, the crazy kitten person who always tricks me into doing things I don't want to do._

* * *

><p>On Thursday evenings, Erik always gets home in a bad mood. Usually it's just general bad mood, because he's tired at the end of a long week and because Massachusetts's weather in the fall is horrible, but on the days when he has lab it was even worse. Erik usually likes labs and other activities that enable him to get hands-on experience, but this particular lab on semiconductors seems like a complete waste of time. The professor teaching it had been one of the most brilliant minds of his time, but that time had been over fifty years ago. Now he's just an old fossil who bores Erik to death on a bi-weekly basis.<p>

His humor doesn't improve when he enters the living room and finds out that not only Charles isn't back from the library yet, Shaw the cat has also taken possession of Erik's favorite armchair and doesn't have the slightest inclination to bugger off. Erik tries to shoo him away and even bodily lift the animal and carry him away, but Shaw has the advantage of a very sharp set of claws, and Erik doesn't feel like losing an eye or an arm to the bloodthirsty beast.

So on Thursday evenings Erik settles in the other armchair, the one covered with faded blue fabric, soft and a little dusty, that Raven likes so much. He takes a book at random from the shelves and pretends to read it. In reality, he's so tired that the words are dancing in front of his eyes, and he spends the time glancing at the clock and counting down the minutes until Charles is back. Sometimes he makes coffee, just so that he has something to do, and then he forgets to drink it and the coffee remains untouched and cooling, until Raven finds it behind a coffee pot two days later while she's cleaning.

Erik looks at the clock with impatience, even though he knows that Charles has just left the campus and won't be home before thirty minutes at least. He gets up to write down something on the shopping list, and then he can't resist the temptation and goes to the window. He lifts the curtain and peeks outside to see whether Charles left the campus early today and maybe he's turning the corner already. (It never happens, Charles is a model student.)

Then finally Charles arrives, when it's dark already because in the fall the sun sets early, and he chides Erik for not switching on the lights and sitting around in the dark. Charles is always frozen to the bone when he arrives, despite the scarf and the half gloves and the collar of his jacket being turned up to protect himself from the wind. He stomps his feet and blows on his fingers to warm them. It's never clear how much Charles is really suffering from the cold and how much he is pretending to get Erik to hug him, but it works every time. Erik hugs his boyfriend tightly and they stay like that, in the half-lit living room, while the cats stare at them unimpressed.

It always ends with Raven wandering in to ask what happened to their dinner, and then complaining because the two of them are letting the food go cold. Erik's face turns scarlet and he complains to Charles about embarrassing displays of affection and swears he'll never hug him ever again, which is such a blatant lie that Charles doesn't even pretend to believe him.

On Thursdays, Charles gets home too late to make dinner, and Erik has been forbidden from cooking when he's on his own because he always turns the kitchen into a complete mess, so Charles always picks up take-away food on his way home. They eat in the kitchen, directly from the plastic boxes so they won't have to wash the dishes later, and Charles tries to be a good older brother and asks Raven what she did in school and whether she learned anything interesting and he recommends her a book that seems very interesting.

Raven rolls her eyes and complains that Charles acts like an old man and she has no idea how Erik could stand him and the book he's recommending is probably some boring doorstopper. She always ignores all the questions about school, though she always gets good grades in her exams so Erik thinks that the two siblings aren't as different as they might seem at a first glance.

While they're talking and eating, the cats prowl around the room and wait for scraps under the table. They're just like a gang. Havok and Banshee are the smallest and have to give precedence to the others, but Moira gets angry if Riptide tries to steal food from the kittens. Azazel, the big fat red cat, acts like the boss and eats as much as everyone else put together. But everyone makes way for Shaw, who's the undisputed cat overlord. Unluckily, Charles has yet to see that the cat is a diabolical criminal mastermind, and passes him pieces of kebab under the table and bends down to scratch him behind the ears.

After dinner Raven goes to her room to do her homework, though Erik suspects that she spends more time on Tumblr than working on her Engli essay, and Charles and Erik get the living room for themselves. (And the cats, of course.) For some unexplained reason, Shaw gives up the armchair when Charles is around, but Charles prefers to curl up on the sofa next to Erik. On Thursdays they're to tired to play chess or cards, so they just turn the tv on and change channels until they find a movie that doesn't suck too much.

Charles follows the movie for a while and then starts complaining aloud about the cold. Erik notes that cat fur is very warm and suggests that they should use their army of cats as impromptu heaters, but he still shuffles closer to Charles. When Raven crosses the corridor to get a glass of water from the kitchen or pick up a book that she left around, they're invariably already cuddling. Raven teases them and Erik acts offended, but at the same time he refuses to move because Charles has stopped complaining about the cold and his hands are nice and warm. Sometimes Azazel and Moira beat Erik to it and jump in Charles' lap, and then Charles doesn't complain about the cold that much, but Erik doesn't care and ends up sprawled over Charles like an octopus anyway.

By the beginning of the second half, Charles and Erik invariably decide that the movie they're watching is the worst pile of crap ever, and they swear that next week they'll rent a DVD to avoid ending up in the exact same situation. (It never happens, they both forget.) But Charles is stubborn and doesn't like to stop watching a movie halfway through, not even their awful Thursday night movies, so they end up chatting about nothing really while on the screen a CIA analyst is messing around with a bomb build by someone who has never seen a real bomb in their life.

They often talk about the weather because, to Erik's chagrin, him and Erik are the kind of old couple who talks about the weather. Charles complains about the cold and the rain and suggests to go to the beach next weekend. Erik lets him talk, even though he knows they'll spend the weekend indoors, studying as always. But Charles likes to daydream, and Erik likes the way Charles' eyes shine when he's daydreaming.

Once, Charles started wondering where he could find a whip to dress up as Indiana Jones for Halloween. Luckily he forgot all about it when Erik got up to get a drink and tripped over Shaw the cat. Charles would have been capable of talking Erik into dressing up as Indy's girlfriend so they could have matching costumes.

Shaw has way too much fun tripping people, especially Erik. He lurkes in the shadows and bids his time. Erik comes back to the sofa with two glasses full of scotch (only half full because the next day they have got classes and they're being responsible adults) and he's very careful where he's putting his feet. Then, when Erik thinks he's safe and is about to give Charles his glass, the cat comes out of nowhere and headbutts him. Erik fights not to lose his balance and curses Shaw in three different languages, while Charles sniggers in his glass.

Most times, Erik falls asleep just before the end of the movie, with his head on Charles' shoulder and a tiny speck of drool at the corner of his mouth. Charles lets him sleep and waits until the end credits are over before turning off the tv. Then he shakes Erik awake and gently pushes him towards the bedroom, because Erik is so tired that if they let him he'd happily stay and sleep on the sofa.

Erik puts on his pajama while Charles brushes his teeth. Sometimes Charles says that he should get Erik a new pajama, but thankfully he hasn't acted on this threat yet. Erik's pajama is old, but it's also very comfortable and familiar and Erik shudders at the idea of throwing it away. They both get under the covers and Charles sets the alarm and wishes Erik goodnight. Something catches in Erik's throat, because this is still new no matter how many times he does it and he can't get used to their stupid domestic routine, to Charles, to the two of them together, to their stupid cats.

Then Azazel sneaks into the room and joins them on the bed, settling down against Erik's legs. Erik whispers goodnight and turns off the light, and he falls asleep with his arms around Charles.


End file.
